Silver Scam - Gaithersburg Coin Exchange

After listening for months to many “buy silver” radio programs and visiting lots of financial websites, I finally decided to invest in some silver bullion and hold it until my retirement. I investigated most of the top sites that retail silver and finally settled on the Gaithersburg Coin Exchange (Gaithersburg Coin Exchange), as having the smallest mark-up, free shipping for orders over $1000, and no sales tax. Gaithersburg also had an excellent online reputation in the somewhat limited information available online. Dr. Roger Mason of Young Again -> Home products personally recommended Gaithersburg Exchange to me. Indiana mandates sales tax of 7% on precious metal sales, or I would have purchased locally.

I had been watching silver climb steadily for several months, and finally got in at the spot price of $20.70 per ounce. I called the Gaithersburg Exchange and placed my order for 500 oz. . The very next week silver fell to $16.90 (if it weren’t for bad luck, I’d have no luck at all –shades of HEE-HAW). Gaithersburg specified that I send a personal check, and they would send my order after the check cleared the bank. I confidently sent them a check for $10,485.00 and waited for three weeks to hear back from them.
Though I received the cancelled check on March 21st, they stated they would
ship my order the first week of April. My order was to be shipped USPS, registered mail, and I would be required to sign for the shipment. All Great.

When I had not received my order by Tuesday April 8th (the SECOND) week of
April, I was starting to become concerned. I called and Gaithersburg informed me my order would be shipped on April 11th. I called again last week (“Yes the order went out on the 11th”), and again yesterday April 19th when I had STILL not received the shipment. Gaithersburg provided me with the tracking number RA476368119 when I requested a tracking number. When I went to the USPS website and attempted to track my shipment, I received the statement “USPS has NO RECORD of this shipment”.


I am now in panic mode concerning this incident. I sent Gaithersburg a registered letter notifying them of my alarm at not yet receiving my order, and asked for an immediate phone call to try and find out what is going on. I was not surprised that USPS did not have a record of the tracking number Gaithersburg gave me because USPS tracking numbers always consist of a series of five 4 digit numbers.

Have I just become a victim of mail fraud? Is it possible they have just cashed my check, and have no intention of sending my silver?

I have contacted the USPS and reported that I have not received a shipment that was promised was mailed. They have assigned me a case number. Other than that, I do not know what to do.


It is too bad I did not find this website before I purchased. Now, I am almost sick with worry. It has taken me YEARS to save $10,000.00 and now I see it with a pair of wings flying out the window. HELP!!

I still have hope that the shipment will arrive and everything will be fine, but that hope is waning rapidly. I am contacting the Maryland Attorney General tomorrow for help.


usmcdad

 

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I know nothing about the particular company you are dealing with. However, many coin and bullion dealers are not particularly good or efficient businesses, and I have waited more than a month on more than one occasion for a delivery. So it might be too early to panic, but it's never too early to investigate. I also can't help but point out a few mistakes you made. First, you watched the price go up and THEN bought silver. This isn't a particularly good investment technique. Second, you placed a large transaction with a dealer you didn't know anything about. I always place a small order or two with any internet dealer I havent' used before to test the service. In your case, it would have been better to pay a few cents more per ounce to use a local dealer that you could visit. Third, you placed several years worth of savings into silver as an investment. Hopefully this isn't most of your savings since silver is basically an inflation and currency hedge, not a real investment in the sense that it produces interest or dividends or growth. Fourth, you bought all of the silver at the same time instead of buying a little at a time over a period of months or years.

Good luck with your investigation. I suspect you will come out okay but please look before you leap in the future.

 

Try This

Sorry to hear about your problem. I would contact your bank first thing in the morning and issue a stop payment on the check - believe it or not you can still do this even after the check has been cashed - even if the funds are not still in the account you should be able to get some, if not all of your funds back - it will also cause the person a serious problem as their account will become overdrawn for whatever amount the account does not have sufficient balance to cover.

Most people think you can only stop payment on a check before it is cashed, but this is in fact not the case.

Do not wait - do it first thing when the bank opens in the morning.

 

I don't get it - if 10,000 dollars is so much money for you, how can you just throw it away? You could have possibly spend some money to pick them up yourself to save the worries or get to the closest bullion dealer in your area. I don't have much sympathy to be honest - testing the service first would have been a better idea.

 

Hi USMCDAD; I sympathize with your situation. I have never heard of the folks that you mention in your post but I am sure that someone else on this forum has and will get back to you with some helpful advise. That number that they gave you doesn't look like any tracking number the the postal service would use. Hang in there my friend. I'm sure all will work out.

 

I agree with Cloud. Especially the part about sending such a large lump sum to a company you didn't know anything about. If I had ten grand to spend on silver, I'd make the trip to the place in person and carry it home same day, or it wouldn't get bought at all.

Hopefully things work out ok and you either get your silver, or you get your money back. Keep us posted as to whats happening.
Guy~

 

Wow, I wish you luck in this matter. I too live in MD and used to visit this coin shop. I would buy supplies and such but thought there coins were high against book..lots to look at though. If this had happened to me..I would be on the phone to any and everyone in law, Gov agenies and Superman to get those wheels a turning. Once spot goes down to $10 you'll probably get your shipment

 

Why don't you file a complaint with the USPS Inspection Service. The company did say they mailed the shipment and they did give you a bogus registered number. That may be considered mail fraud. If you go to the USPS Inspection Service web site you can fill out a mail fraud complaint on line. You never know it may help. Here the Inspection Service site: http://postalinspectors.uspis.gov/

Lou

 

USMCDAD - Last summer, I purchased a set of gold coins from someone on ebay. Three weeks went by and my set still did not show up. Based on a past experience, I immediately started investigations with the post office, ebay and paypal. Fortunately, the seller kept in great contact with me so I never thought he was trying to cheat me, unlike my first bad experience. He gave me a tracking number but during the first week or so nothing came up. Then I saw where it was in this one distribution center, but by this time three weeks had gone by. By the forth week, the coin set was found. Ended up that the post office had it in a safe at my local distribution center. But according to the USPS website, the package was not even close to me. This is what the post office told me happened: However it was sent (I can't remember if it was certified or registered or both) it was placed in a secure location in the post office. With each movement, whoever transported the set had to document that they handled the package. I was told by my local post office official that sometimes, because the package is stored in a safe, usually on location, but seperate from the general mail population, that whoever is supposed to transport it sometimes forgets to pull it out of the safe. Therefore, it just takes longer to receive. Didn't make me feel any better, but I did receive it and I was happy. I kept checking the USPS tracking site and a week later it finally showed up as being delieved to my local post office. Almost a month went by before everything was completed.

I hope this gives you a glimmer of hope that your package could still be out there. I do not judge your decisions - those are decisions that you have to learn from and unfortuately, live with. Many of us have been there, in some way, to varying degrees. I am sorry that have to worry about this. I hope it all works out.

And shame on Gaithersburg Coins if they have not sent out your package and make you worry like that. If they value you as a customer, they should stay in contact with you until a solution is found - that is the least they can do.

 

sorry to hear about your experience. hopefuly everything works out i too am waiting on some stuff from overseas that hasnt showed up yet

 

I want to thank all those who posted a reply to my incident for your helpful advice. You have given me some good ideas to pursue, if it becomes necessary. Those who are able to put yourself in my shoes are a lift for my spirit.

I know that there is an extreme shortage of silver and gold right now, because the smart people, the ones with any sense of trends know that the dollar is collapsing and we are headed for a severe recession or depression. $5.00/gallon milk and $4.00 gallon gas doesn't leave a lot of cash in your pocket if you have a family to support. The FED has managed to drive the dollar down from a true value of $1.00 to about 1 cent today from when the FED was created in 1913.

I still have hope that my shipment will arrive and all this worry will have been for naught. I will keep the developments posted on this thread.

Best,

usmcdad

 

EDIT: didnt realize you found the other thread where someone got burned by them

 

usmcdad. You cannot stop a check once the check has been cashed. No way. Never. Cant happen. All you can do is claim fraud that the person who cashed the check is not the person(company) to whom it was sent. and then the true company needs to claim they never received the check. It doesnt look that way from what you posted. And even though they told you they sent a registered letter. That in itself isnt mail fraud. Since the amount is over 10,000 dollars, it becomes a felony. Good luck.

 

I'm not sure I see the problem. I just checked the tracking number you provided (you left the "US" off of the end of it so I added it to my search) and here is what the website is saying:

If you are concerned about the slowness of delivery you should continue to complain to them and potentially choose another vendor for your next bullion purchase. I don't think you need to be concerned about non-delivery though.

 

I am not familiar with dealers selling at spot. This should have been your first red flag.

Get your money back then ask for a lot more advice before you go tossing money around. Silver has been a very volatile market. It changes in minutes.

If you want to spend 10 grand on silver I, and ohers, can lead you to trusted dealers.

clembo

 

I think it is unfair to label them as not trustworthy. They are a fairly large player in the bullion coin market as far as silver goes and since the OP lives in Indiana that rules out SilverTowne (which would have been the best choice were it not for the sales tax issue).

 

500 troy ounces is what, 42 troy ounds and I guarantee it is coming registered and insured...give it time. It is not late yet.

 

Also remember that bullion dealers work on a very small margin and many (most?) do not keep the bullion in inventory. Inventory costs money. The bullion dealer is content making a small markup over his cost. So many bullion dealers don't order the bullion from their suppliers until they have a confirmed order from a buyer.

Silver bullion has been in short supply lately so it may be taking this dealer a bit longer to get his hands on that much silver. My advice is to be patient. You should be receiving your silver bullion order soon.

 

Other than the red flag comment (If you want to take it as such) I don't believe I said they were "untrustworthy".

I have not bought from them but have bought from a few others in the past and NEVER had such problems.

If you can point the OP to places to buy at spot might I suggest you do so?

clembo

 

All that I can say is:
Welcome to the forum & Good luck!